The Crocodilehttp://thecroc.com
Intelligent, award winning marketingThu, 30 Jul 2015 16:45:54 +0000en-UShourly1An A-Z of social media management toolshttp://thecroc.com/social-2/the-a-z-of-socialmedia-tools/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/the-a-z-of-socialmedia-tools/#commentsThu, 30 Jul 2015 15:59:35 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=4023When you’re looking after social media for brands it’s useful to have a wide-ranging arsenal of tools: those go-to websites, apps and dashboards that help make the always-on environment more manageable. For sharing, tracking, content creation, analysing, streaming or collaborating – you name it, there’s a tool for it! At The Crocodile, we’re always on […]

]]>When you’re looking after social media for brands it’s useful to have a wide-ranging arsenal of tools: those go-to websites, apps and dashboards that help make the always-on environment more manageable.

For sharing, tracking, content creation, analysing, streaming or collaborating – you name it, there’s a tool for it!

At The Crocodile, we’re always on the lookout for new tools to explore and take advantage of. Here’s a round up of some of the best. A top ten wasn’t going to cut it so we settled on an (almost) A-Z!

]]>http://thecroc.com/social-2/the-a-z-of-socialmedia-tools/feed/0The Crocodile to promote Standard Life workplace pension schemehttp://thecroc.com/digital/standard-life-enrols-crocodile/
http://thecroc.com/digital/standard-life-enrols-crocodile/#commentsMon, 27 Jul 2015 14:06:56 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=4006In great news for the agency, The Crocodile has won a multi-phase pitch to promote Standard Life’s online auto-enrolment solution for SME workplace pensions. Changes in government legislation mean that all employers – even if they only have one worker – must set up a scheme, and as the leading provider of income drawdown and […]

]]>In great news for the agency, The Crocodile has won a multi-phase pitch to promote Standard Life’s online auto-enrolment solution for SME workplace pensions.

Changes in government legislation mean that all employers – even if they only have one worker – must set up a scheme, and as the leading provider of income drawdown and workplace pensions, Standard Life has created what is recognised as the most straight-forward answer for small and medium enterprises.

The scheme is called Good to Goand it provides businesses with a quick, understandable and fully compliant pension solution, available online. The Crocodile will be driving companies to the auto-enrolment website where they can sign up.

We showed Standard Life how we would generate traffic primarily through a combination of SEO, PPC and display remarketing , as well as ongoing organic and paid social media. Conversion rates will be maximised by optimising the customer’s journey through the campaign site.

The Crocodile won this strategic assignment following pitch rounds in London and Edinburgh against other leading B2B marketing agencies. For us it was a great chance to showcase our financial services credentials and bring to life our Creating Conversations proposition.

]]>http://thecroc.com/digital/standard-life-enrols-crocodile/feed/0Board of marketing?http://thecroc.com/social-2/board-marketing/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/board-marketing/#commentsFri, 17 Jul 2015 08:52:58 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3965A board game about marketing was sent into The Croc the other day, and while it seemed like a novel concept at first, we soon realised that lots of games subliminally convey marketing messages. So far in the Mattel School of Marketing, we have… Monopoly – the game is all about getting the maximum return […]

]]>A board game about marketing was sent into The Croc the other day, and while it seemed like a novel concept at first, we soon realised that lots of games subliminally convey marketing messages.

So far in the Mattel School of Marketing, we have…

Monopoly – the game is all about getting the maximum return on your investment while staying out of jail – both of which work in the marketing context too.

Jenga – not technically a board game, but there are times when you need to strip away as much as possible, but still leave enough there so that the messaging still stands up.

Buckaroo – then there are times when you’re asked to pile on as much as possible and hope that your audience doesn’t kick off.

Snakes & Ladders – most marketing agencies will agree with this one: you spend ages building up SEO or social followers, only for a change of algorithm or a cull of fake users to leave you back where you started.

Kerplunk – the antithesis of marketing, as you hope that your actions will keep the funnel blocked up and cause all the trickle-down to go towards your competitors.

Operation – marketing can be tricky, but it’s not really brain surgery!

That’s our list, how about yours? Let us know which games remind you of marketing practices by sending us a message with the hashtag #boardofmarketing.

]]>In the fast-growing market for high performance building insulation products and solutions (set to be worth £17.5 billion globally by 2020), they don’t come much bigger than Kingspan Insulation.

With huge global market share – and with manufacturing, distribution and commercial operations throughout Europe, North America, Australasia and other locations worldwide – when Kingspan says it’s about to announce a major product breakthrough, the sector and the building industry tends to listen.

On this occasion, The Crocodile will be playing a part in delivering the message.

We’ve been appointed by Kingspan to support and coordinate the global launch of IPN-QuadCore, a revolutionary new core material for insulated panels that can take building performance and efficiency levels through the, um… roof.

Insulation products are on the front line of worldwide efforts to reduce global warming, as they can reduce the need for the heating or cooling of buildings by up to 75%. The unique micro-cell structure of Kingspan’s IPN-QuadCore is helping to bring the tomorrow’s world of Net Zero Energy buildings one step closer. As they say, #itsinthecore.

It’s serious innovation to address a serious challenge for the building sector. We couldn’t be happier to support this important breakthrough.

]]>http://thecroc.com/digital/kingspan/feed/0THE CROCBITES SOCIAL MEDIA ROUNDUP – JUNE 2015http://thecroc.com/social-2/social-media-roundup-june-2015/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/social-media-roundup-june-2015/#commentsFri, 03 Jul 2015 09:03:06 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3953Whilst social media is easily accessible and cost-effective compared to traditional channels, its constantly evolving nature makes it one of the most time-intensive activities for brands to manage. The complexities excite and inspire us at The Crocodile. To keep our clients and ourselves abreast of all the emerging trends and technologies, we bring you the @crocbites monthly […]

]]>Whilst social media is easily accessible and cost-effective compared to traditional channels, its constantly evolving nature makes it one of the most time-intensive activities for brands to manage. The complexities excite and inspire us at The Crocodile.

To keep our clients and ourselves abreast of all the emerging trends and technologies, we bring you the @crocbites monthly social media roundup, with plenty for B2B marketers to sink their teeth into.

Facebook

Marketers will be heartened by Facebook’s announcement that Ads Manager and Power Editor have had a revamp. The former now brings performance metrics to the forefront, while the latter’s got a new layout that’s easier to use.

As we’ve mentionedpreviously, Messenger is really being bulked out as a standalone app, and that’s continuing as now that you can use it without a Facebook account. All you need is a name, number and photo – kinda like WhatsApp…

Sharing locations is also getting easier, which could prove useful if Messenger for Business takes off and you need to tell a delivery driver where to bring your package.

Twitter

Videos will now autoplay on Twitter, although users can select to turn off the feature in the settings.

Twitter is testing an experience that collates relevant content and displays it with product/place tweets; it’s also giving a trial to collections by influencers, which can help push products and other content.

The latest development to DMs sees the end of the 140-character limit (although that will remain for tweets). Instead, DMs can be up to 10,000 characters long, making communication much easier, although any temptation to spam users must be resisted.

Instagram

Instagrammers can now benefit from a more powerful search function and a reimagined Explore page that will show trends in real-time, so that conversations can be joined instantly.

Pinterest announces the Marketing Development Partners (MDPs) that will help businesses organise their advertising on the medium. It can work too – one company that had a trial with an MDP saw a 4,000% uptick in Pinterest-referred revenue.

That’s it for this social media roundup – if you spot anything in July you think we should include next month, tweet us: @crocbites.

]]>http://thecroc.com/social-2/social-media-roundup-june-2015/feed/0The Crocbites social media roundup – May 2015http://thecroc.com/social-2/crocbites-social-media-roundup-may-2015/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/crocbites-social-media-roundup-may-2015/#commentsThu, 04 Jun 2015 15:53:19 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3939At The Crocodile, we’re excited and inspired by the complexity of the social media landscape. Whilst social media is easily accessible and cost-effective compared to traditional channels, its constantly evolving nature makes it one of the most time-intensive activities for brands to manage. To keep our clients and ourselves abreast of all the emerging trends and […]

]]>At The Crocodile, we’re excited and inspired by the complexity of the social media landscape. Whilst social media is easily accessible and cost-effective compared to traditional channels, its constantly evolving nature makes it one of the most time-intensive activities for brands to manage. To keep our clients and ourselves abreast of all the emerging trends and technologies, we bring you the @crocbites monthly social media roundup, with plenty for B2B marketers to sink their teeth into.

Facebook

Facebook’s Instant articles feature means articles opened in Facebook will now run within the social media site, rather than redirecting to an external web page as they did before. It should make the loading speed 10 times quicker, allowing for a faster and more comfortable process of reading articles.

You can now forget copy and pasting URLs into your Facebook updates with the introduction of Add A Link, which allows you to quickly search for links on the site and easily add them to your status.

Brands have a new opportunity to connect with their customers via WhatsApp as of May. Facebook has identified this opportunity with the rising popularity of its $19bn messaging app, meaning brands can reach out to their audience more directly.

Twitter

Want to understand just what kind of audience you’re attracting on Twitter? Now you can gain audience insight from demographics to TV viewing behaviour, allowing you to target ads to your key audience with a lot more depth.

Twitter has now given API access to uploading videos and a protocol to enable bulk uploads. This new feature eliminates problems of file size and connection speed, with bulk uploads allowing you to upload in pieces.

Advertisers can now create objective-based campaigns on Twitter, which simplifies the process of creating an adverts delivered via the medium.

YouTube

YouTube has in its latest round of updates introduced TrueView for shopping, which allows viewers to buy the subject of your advert with just one click.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn has made various changes to the way its developer programme is focused in May by shifting the focus onto partnership integrations over the popularly used open API.

Pinterest

Pinterest has unveiled new features that will help to increase brand awareness. Most noticeable was the new feature Cinematic Pins, and improved measuring of a pinner’s behaviour through repins to build a stronger knowledge of their future activity.

That’s it for this social media roundup – if you spot anything in June you think we should include next month, drop us a tweet via @crocbites.

]]>http://thecroc.com/social-2/crocbites-social-media-roundup-may-2015/feed/0Geeks of the Marketing Stack: Unite!http://thecroc.com/digital/geeks-of-the-marketing-stack-unite/
http://thecroc.com/digital/geeks-of-the-marketing-stack-unite/#commentsWed, 20 May 2015 12:13:17 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3883Geeks rule! We’ve all heard that information is power and this has never been more true in today’s digital age as we race to unearth the intelligence to make better decisions more quickly and with greater purpose. Embracing our inner geek is critical and the most effective marketers are already making this a priority and […]

]]>Geeks rule! We’ve all heard that information is power and this has never been more true in today’s digital age as we race to unearth the intelligence to make better decisions more quickly and with greater purpose.

Embracing our inner geek is critical and the most effective marketers are already making this a priority and evolving the very role of marketing itself.

For many marketers, however, the penny has not yet dropped. Depending on which study you have read over the last two or three years, 70 to 80% of the purchase decision is now made before picking up the phone or contacting sales. “Old news,” I hear you all cry, but what does it actually mean to marketing teams? It means opportunity, baby!

The tide is turning in the favour of the intrepid CMO. In a small but growing number of enterprises, marketing is demonstrating the power to manage and influence that 70 to 80% and can prove it by tracking, monitoring, analysing and responding to real-time data as the customer leaves their digital footprint. Marketing is now capable of bringing a whole new ball game to the boardroom table.

I’m not suggesting this is an easy thing to do, as it requires attitudinal, organisational and a whole host of other critical factors to be aligned, not to mention a team of talented people with a common purpose and vision of how things need to get done.

We are already seeing growth in marketing agencies (like The Crocodile) and client-side departments capable of delivering systems integration, tying together software platforms – including marketing automation software, CRM systems, data management platforms, content platforms and analytics tools – into what is known as the Marketing Stack.

The Stack offers a marketing approach that can make sense of customer behaviour, plan for it and deliver commercial success from it. The geek factor requires us to be interested and curious, to intellectually challenge convention, to embrace technology and data, to be excited by analytics, and to challenge the logic of department silos. We don’t see connecting Marketing and IT as the destination – instead we see it as a step in a much bigger customer experience picture. Econsultancy wrote an interesting piece on how this might impact organisational structure.

An integrated Marketing Stack can converge data and – with human intervention – help to provide critical insight about the target market. Not only does this allow marketing to serve relevant and personalised messages to the right people at the right time, it can also – over time – help to anticipate their needs and perhaps even create products the customer base didn’t even know it wanted. Organisations such as Amazon and Netflix have been living this promise for some time now and Tesco have recently created a new Chief Customer Officer (CCO), so it’s not a flight of fantasy. It’s very real and it’s happening as we speak.

At The Crocodile, we’re involved in this transformation with a number of our clients and we are (gently) challenging the role of marketing. The geek in us forces us to take a holistic approach to platforms and technology with a view to designing and implementing Marketing Stacks that use the Force, sorry, data and transform it into actionable intelligence.

It’s not a quick fix, or necessarily an easy transformation, but we believe in it and have signed up to the movement.

]]>http://thecroc.com/digital/geeks-of-the-marketing-stack-unite/feed/0#GE2015: The social media election?http://thecroc.com/social-2/ge2015-social-media-election/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/ge2015-social-media-election/#commentsThu, 07 May 2015 15:29:54 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3863Today has been touted as the social media election, but has it been? Short answer, yes with an if; long answer, no with a but. The trouble is, ‘social media election’ is such a nebulous phrase – does it mean most election news is coming from social media or most reactions are appearing on it? […]

]]>Today has been touted as the social media election, but has it been?
Short answer, yes with an if; long answer, no with a but.

The trouble is, ‘social media election’ is such a nebulous phrase – does it mean most election news is coming from social media or most reactions are appearing on it? Something in between or something we haven’t even considered until it happens?

What can be certain is that as social is now much more mature than it was in 2010, it’s on the radar for parties, voters and commenters as an alternative way to get their points across and engage in conversations. How effective they are at doing these things, though, is the question.

How have the parties done?

Let’s look at Labour – they seem to have made the greatest strides on social, intentionally or otherwise, with the Milibrand interview, #Milifandom, the #EdStone and the fortuitous timing of #EdBallsDay all featuring during the campaign. There’s even been a late move to defend how Ed Miliband eats bacon sandwiches via #JeSuisEd.

All of the above found various levels of natural virality, whereas if we look at the Conservatives, they were spending £100,000 a month of Facebook adverts last November – a figure you can only imagine has increased during election season. Don’t get me wrong, Facebook ads can work, but if you’re entering a popularity contest, organic growth must be preferable.

Take the Greens – their #ChangeTheTune party political broadcast got plenty of interest, with 860,000 views on YouTube at present – proof that you don’t have to be a big-hitter with a massive budget as long as you strike a chord with your audience.

In the interests of fairness, we should look at the other parties – the Lib Dems haven’t had the traditional coverage they received in 2010, with tweets seeming to be their main refuge. Of course, it’s a two-way street, with many tweeters displeased with their spell in government. The medium has been a mixed bag for the SNP and Ukip too, with Nicola Sturgeon’s performances in the leaders’ debates generally being praised, while Ukip have seen hashtags turned against them, and Nigel Farage, well…

Election day

So that’s been the run-up to the big day – how has social media looked today? I don’t know about you, but my Facebook timeline has been covered in posts saying that people are voting, while the #IVoted, #votingmatters, #GE2015, #democracy and other related hashtags have all been trending well as the day’s progressed.

It’s not dissimilar from the content that’s been around at other major points of the election – the leaders’ debates and manifesto launches, for example – so if we’re taking that as being the measure of this campaign being the social media election, then it’s safe to say it is.

However, if we’re looking for unique shareable content and stories starting online, we’re a long way off, although steps have been made in the right direction. Maybe the answer will come in the form of an election app, where you can find all the information you need and vote from your mobile? Let’s see where we are by the time #GE2020 rolls around.

]]>http://thecroc.com/social-2/ge2015-social-media-election/feed/0The Crocbites Social Media Roundup – April 2015http://thecroc.com/social-2/crocbites-social-media-roundup-2/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/crocbites-social-media-roundup-2/#commentsFri, 01 May 2015 11:06:55 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3885Such was the success of our review of social media happenings over the first quarter of the year, we’ve decided to go monthly and there’s plenty for B2B marketers to sink their teeth into this time around… Facebook Facebook throws down the gauntlet to brands – create content that people interact with otherwise reach and […]

]]>Such was the success of our review of social media happenings over the first quarter of the year, we’ve decided to go monthly and there’s plenty for B2B marketers to sink their teeth into this time around…

Facebook

Facebook throws down the gauntlet to brands – create content that people interact with otherwise reach and referral traffic could dip.

]]>http://thecroc.com/social-2/crocbites-social-media-roundup-2/feed/0Beware of Mobilegeddonhttp://thecroc.com/digital/beware-mobilegeddon/
http://thecroc.com/digital/beware-mobilegeddon/#commentsTue, 21 Apr 2015 16:42:26 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3833You know the drill by now: -gate is added to the end of a word to denote a controversy and -geddon is the suffix of choice for something cataclysmic. With that in mind, ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you MOBILEGEDDON. In case you missed it, from today (Tuesday 21st April 2015), Google’s algorithms […]

]]>You know the drill by now: -gate is added to the end of a word to denote a controversy and -geddon is the suffix of choice for something cataclysmic. With that in mind, ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you MOBILEGEDDON.

In case you missed it, from today (Tuesday 21st April 2015), Google’s algorithms will now favour sites that work well on mobile devices. Why? Quite simply, a lot more people are using smartphones and tablets to search these days, so Google wants to enhance the user experience.

Usually when Google alters its algorithms, news only usually gets as far as technology-specific sites, as a lot of the time the differences are negligible to the end user. This time though, the BBC, Sky and Forbes are among the major media outlets that are all running with the story, so it clearly has wider implications – including for B2B marketing.

Surviving Mobilegeddon

Paul Wright, The Crocodile’s SEO guru, explains that not optimising your site will result in it being ranked lower in organic searches, with the opposite being true of sites that do have the newly coveted mobile-friendly tag at the start of their meta descriptions.

Featuring lower down on SERPs (search engine results pages) is likely to have a negative impact on click-through results, which can have very real impacts on your bottom line, particularly if you’re an online vendor. If people can’t find your site, that will reduce your ad revenue (where applicable) and from a content point of view, it’ll be like a tree falling in a forest: if you’re creating great content but nobody can see it, what’s the point?

This is just touching on what we know will happen as a result of the algorithm change – there are hypotheticals that we won’t know the answer to until the alterations have bedded in. This isn’t a false alarm, people – making sure your site works on mobile devices really needs to be considered a critical part of your SEO and business strategy.

There are two outcomes here: you become mobile-friendly and maintain or improve your SERP ranking compared to rivals that don’t adapt; alternatively, you maintain the status quo and hope for the best. We wouldn’t recommend option B.

Handily, Google has provided its own testing tool to help you work out what needs to change on your site in order to appeal to both search engine algorithms and the people who are looking at it on the move.

While that may cover what needs doing, to discuss how to do it, start a conversation with The Crocodile today.

]]>http://thecroc.com/digital/beware-mobilegeddon/feed/0The Crocbites social media rounduphttp://thecroc.com/digital/crocbites-social-media-roundup/
http://thecroc.com/digital/crocbites-social-media-roundup/#commentsMon, 20 Apr 2015 11:12:04 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3816The world of social media is constantly evolving, so it’s easy to miss the latest developments – thinking about it, someone should probably devise an app for that. Until then though, The Crocodile brings you a regular roundup of the changes and announcements made by Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and the rest, that will impact on […]

]]>The world of social media is constantly evolving, so it’s easy to miss the latest developments

– thinking about it, someone should probably devise an app for that.

Until then though, The Crocodile brings you a regular roundup of the changes and announcements made by Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and the rest, that will impact on how your brand and your customers use social. Without further ado, let’s begin…

Bored of endless email chains in the office? Try out the snappily titled Facebook at Work.

Facebook Messenger gets a revamp – not only can you now develop apps for it, but you can also use it as a way of interacting directly with your customers via Businesses on Messenger, a set of services to allow companies to interact with individuals.

If your business targets expats then you’ll be delighted to know that Facebook now lets you do just that with new ad targeting capabilities. Etihad Airways is the first brand to trial the service.

Want better Twitter analytics? Need a collection of tweets or Vines around a certain topic? You’re in luck. Twitter has launched Curator, a free tool for media outlets that provides search and insights into trending topics and conversations.

In other news, you can now reach more customers by placing ads on third-party websites’ Twitter streams.

Pinterest has opened up paid-for to US partners. A trial reported on by B2B Marketing revealed that Promoted Pins perform as well as and sometimes better than organic pins.

The image-based social network has also announced Pinstitue a programme designed to educate businesses on how to connect with users and run successful campaigns.

LinkedIn

Open more conversations with your contacts and prospects with the wider rollout of published posts. Build your profile by contributing insights and expertise, further establishing your professional identity.

Tumblr

Tumblr’s all about gifs and photos, right? Wrong. New features make it simpler to contribute long form content and see Tumblr pitting itself against blogging platforms like Medium and WordPress.

Snapchat

Apparently Snapchat isn’t just about self-destructing photos any more. With the new Discover feature, the app is positioning itself as a publisher, collaborating with creative and editorial teams to share their work with 100 million active monthly users.

That’s it for now – if you’ve got wind of any social media developments that you think are potential game changers for businesses, let us know and we’ll include them in our next roundup.

]]>http://thecroc.com/digital/crocbites-social-media-roundup/feed/0The Crocodile and B2B marketing best practicehttp://thecroc.com/digital/crocodile-b2b-marketing-best-practice/
http://thecroc.com/digital/crocodile-b2b-marketing-best-practice/#commentsWed, 08 Apr 2015 11:20:25 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3775Marketing techniques continue to develop at frightening speed and at The Crocodile we’ve never been more excited by what’s possible. B2BMarketing.net and The Crocodile are both champions of best practice and have a shared passion to ignite the imagination of marketers, so it will be no surprise to learn that we are taking a number […]

]]>Marketing techniques continue to develop at frightening speed and at The Crocodile we’ve never been more excited by what’s possible.

B2BMarketing.net and The Crocodile are both champions of best practice and have a shared passion to ignite the imagination of marketers, so it will be no surprise to learn that we are taking a number of joint initiatives this year.

Firstly we have signed up as a headline sponsor to the hotly contested B2B Awards. This has become not only an important annual gathering of leading B2B marketing practitioners, it’s a genuine exposition of innovation in marketing. We are delighted to have this association.

We are also making an editorial contribution to the B2B Marketing Knowledge Bank, an essential resource for today’s B2B marketer, providing dedicated resource and best practice against specialist topics.

The Crocodile is widely regarded as a leader in B2B social marketing, delivering insight driven social media that gets people talking. Through 2015 we will be focusing on this topic area, working with the Knowledge Bank to inform and expose B2B marketers to what can be achieved using social marketing.

At The Crocodile we believe B2B social has come of age and we encourage marketers to think strategically, to consider the technology possibilities that drive real-time insight and to be open to persistent innovation and a relentless focus on ‘people’.

All too often we see ‘anti-social’ behavior that manifests in a failure to listen and participate in a two-way dialogue, undermining the basics of a good conversation. Conversely, our approach to social media places the customer at the heart of the strategy with a view to building enduring and more rewarding relationships. This requires a number of skills including the analytical capabilities to unearth actionable insights.

To underline our advocacy of this approach we will also be rewarding best practice as sponsors of the Best Use of Customer Insight category at the B2B Awards.

It should be a fantastic night, the industry’s big annual conversation.

]]>http://thecroc.com/digital/crocodile-b2b-marketing-best-practice/feed/0Social media advertising: what’s not to like?http://thecroc.com/social-2/3dconnexion-makes-right-connections-social-media-advertising/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/3dconnexion-makes-right-connections-social-media-advertising/#commentsSun, 22 Mar 2015 19:49:28 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3643It’s no secret that Facebook restricts a business profile’s organic reach to as little as 1% of the total audience. As such, it’s frustratingly hard for organisations to connect with their Facebook audience. If your posts aren’t being seen, liked, shared or commented on, it’s very challenging to grow your audience organically. Fortunately there’s an answer. […]

]]>It’s no secret that Facebook restricts a business profile’s organic reach to as little as 1% of the total audience.

As such, it’s frustratingly hard for organisations to connect with their Facebook audience. If your posts aren’t being seen, liked, shared or commented on, it’s very challenging to grow your audience organically. Fortunately there’s an answer. With a relatively small social media advertising investment businesses can quickly grow their audience. And once you start spending, the clever stuff begins.

3Dconnexion, advanced input devices for design and visualisation professionals, joined Facebook in June 2010. At first, it struggled to increase Facebook page likes and generate extended reach among its target audience organically, despite creating great content and engaging social posts.

To address this, 3Dconnexion, working with The Crocodile, has invested a small amount of money on Facebook advertising, to tap into relevant communities on the network to increase page likes.

The Crocodile used Facebook insights data to identify when conversations were happening, where they were taking place and key trends and topics being discussed. Combined with guidance on advertising tactics, this approach has helped 3Dconnexion rapidly grow its audience. Using highly targeted ads based on interests, age, gender, location and device, The Crocodile was able to promote the 3Dconnexion brand to the right audience and drive people back to its Facebook page.

In just six months 3Dconnexion’s Facebook audience grew 360% – from 8,600 followers to almost 31,000! Comments, shares and post likes also grew significantly with a focused approach that promoted selected content to the audience it was created for.

The larger audience size has reinforced the importance of testing different types of Facebook content and posting at different times of day, in order to identify when the audience is most receptive to hearing from 3Dconnexion. This learning feeds directly into the constantly evolving social media strategy.

Adapting the approach to target people at events and conferences or followers of peer brands is a powerful way of generating awareness of your brand and increasing engagement with existing and potential consumers.

Unlocking the full potential of social media does require media spend, but the good news is a little can go a long way! It doesn’t take long to start meeting your goals with the right investment, at the right time, in the right place. Whether your objective is audience growth, increased engagement, click-throughs or conversions we can help to unlock the potential of your business Facebook page just like we did for 3Dconnexion.

]]>http://thecroc.com/social-2/3dconnexion-makes-right-connections-social-media-advertising/feed/0Glad rags and hashtagshttp://thecroc.com/social-2/glad-rags-hashtags/
http://thecroc.com/social-2/glad-rags-hashtags/#commentsFri, 27 Feb 2015 16:30:29 +0000http://thecroc.com/?p=3618Recent projects for the social media team have involved tapping into trends at London Fashion Week and raising a virtual glass to winners at The Brit Awards.These events both created a huge buzz on social media and we were able to piggyback popular hashtags to extend reach. Understanding how to strategically implement social media trends is a key part of […]

]]>Recent projects for the social media team have involved tapping into trends at London Fashion Week and raising a virtual glass to winners at The Brit Awards.These events both created a huge buzz on social media and we were able to piggyback popular hashtags to extend reach. Understanding how to strategically implement social media trends is a key part of delivering a meaningful and engaging experience to target audiences.

Earlier this year The Crocodile was appointed by an iconic Swiss watch brand to manage and grow its social media presence in the UK. At London Fashion Week we were supporting the launch of a new collection of watches themed around pets. With a canine mascot in a bow tie and a ‘pooch parlour’ for furry fashionistas, the opportunity to jump on the #dogsofinstagram trend was too good to miss.

A quick search on Instagram reveals more than 16,770,000 posts tagged #dogsofinstagram, with that number increasing by the second. The trend was born on Instagram but extends to other social platforms including Twitter, Tumblr and Pinterest due to the ubiquitous nature of hashtags. Taking an agile approach on social media management and keeping on top of trends as they are happening will help keep your social media marketing relevant and ensure you’re reaching the right people – in this case dog lovers!

In another example of proactive social media outreach, The Brit Awards provided an opportunity to build music associations for our client Heidsieck Monopole. The champagne brand recently announced a three-year sponsorship deal with the Barclaycard British Summer Time Festival. This new affiliation with music opens up opportunities to grow Heidsieck Monopole’s visibility on social media and hopping on trends like #BRITs2015 and #MusicMonday is just the beginning. We’re also looking at new ways to reach music fans including branded playlists on Spotify and a hashtag driven calendar of social competitions and events in the run up to the festival.

Tactics like this help expand reach, amplify brands, improve SEO, and get content seen by the right audiences. It’s equally important to know where to draw the line. A trend we couldn’t justify hopping on was the #FallenMadonna tag following the Queen of Pop’s unfortunate tumble during her Brits performance. For a brand like Velcro though that could have been social media gold! Much like Oreo’s “dunk in the dark” tweet that went viral during the Super Bowl XLVII blackout.

As committed social media marketers we’re always on the look out for an Oreo moment. The truth is they are few and far between but making sure our clients are in the right place at the right time gives us a better chance than most. To see how we can help you optimise your social media presence, drop me a line.